Emptying House; Dust EVERYWHERE; Housecleaners

We are at the point in this move where I keep getting startled by empty spaces. The bathroom closet still has the whole stack of towels, but the other shelves have nothing on them except a package of incense, a box of matches, a bottle of NyQuil, a box of bandaids, and a container of nailpolish remover. We have a big piece of furniture with drawers and shelves and a fold-down desk, and it is empty except for some miscellaneous trash (dust, scraps of paper, old empty water balloon, clump of staples, old Webkinz collector card, plastic wrapper, broken colored pencil, single wrinkled envelope) I have for some reason not been able to summon the morale to dispose of. There are empty bookshelves all over the house, or bookshelves with just a few books left on them.

Something I hadn’t realized is that having the new house’s floors refinished would result in DUST LITERALLY COVERING EVERYTHING IN THE WHOLE HOUSE. It’s all in the woodwork. It’s on every cupboard/drawer handle. It’s on the curtain rods and the curtains. Paul did one of his things I am grateful for, which is that he kept pushing forward on hiring housecleaners to handle it, even though I kept panicking and despairing and pushing back and giving up about the cost and the difficulty in finding/choosing someone. We now have cleaners booked for the first week of December, and they are going to get rid of all the dust and also they are going to clean the bathrooms and the kitchen and the refrigerator and the stove, and then they are going to come back every two weeks after that and we will see if I can handle that without freaking out all the time (the expense! people in my house!) and can instead feel happy and life-changed and appreciative. I am thinking I will tie this in to my social life: if I give the cleaners their own key, I can plan to be out having coffee with a friend whenever they’re due to be there.

FURTHERMORE, now that we Have Cleaners, we can also have them clean our OLD house after we move out! So I will not have to do it! I can just write a big check and say “Okay, we’re out and you can get in there now!”

We’re not REALLY turning our minds to it until we’re moved out, but we have to consult a realtor about what to do with our old house. It’s zoned residential/commercial and it’s in a busy/commercial area without a lot of other houses around, so it’s very possible that we could spend a ton of money having it painted and having the floors refinished and having it cleaned—and then a business would come along, buy it, and bulldoze it, wasting all the money/effort. But if we DON’T do the painting/refinishing/cleaning, perhaps that DOOMS the house to be interesting only to a business. Well. We’re hoping the realtor will be surer about what we should do. And at least now we know to have the floors refinished BEFORE hiring cleaners.

16 thoughts on “Emptying House; Dust EVERYWHERE; Housecleaners

  1. Alice

    Dusting is my least favorite cleaning activity (followed closely by cleaning shower / tub walls) and I remain EQUALLY GRATEFUL every single time our cleaning lady does it, even though this has been happening for literal years at this point. I would give up many other frivolous and not-so-frivolous expenses before giving up my beloved cleaning lady.

    A realtor should *definitely* be able to advise on how much effort & money to put back into the old house – and if they seem unsure or unable to give good advice… get another realtor. Realtors have a STARTLING diversity in skill/ability, and having a good one makes an insane amount of difference.

    Reply
  2. Therese

    OMG, having a house cleaner to assist with the moving (pre and post) cleaning as well as regular maintenance cleaning is a lifesaver! I so realize that it’s a financial privilege but I’m willing to forego other discretionary purchases to afford it. I find my house stays put together better b/c of the housekeeper. I tell my family, “It’s the housekeeper’s job to actually clean and scrub, NOT pick up stuff!” Therefore, everyone has to regularly keep things picked up and put away. Clutter causes me major anxiety so in addition to not having to be the one to scrub toilets and dust, clutter is much more managed with a housekeeper. It’s wonderful!

    Reply
    1. Jessemy

      Therese, I’m seconding your comment. The cleaning day forces all of us to tidy up far more regularly than we would otherwise. I love it!

      Reply
  3. Shannon Mateo

    We own a piece of land with four houses zoned commercial / residential. What we found is, commercial sales can be a huge pain in the ass. IF they intend to bulldoze it’s easier. However if a business intends to move in for business purposes (lawyer, or something), I found that in our area they were being told they would have to put in handicap access, curb & gutter parking with handicap, fire sprinklers, handicap bathrooms, etc, etc, etc, to the point it scared potential businesses away from purchase. We ended up removing two of them from commercial and going only residential. They sold quickly. The one we did sell commercial was sold to be demolished for a car lot.

    None of those improvments above would be your burden, I just know it made it so much harder to sell commercial when all of the businesses were being frightened by allllll the repairs they would have to do to move in.

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  4. Jaida

    Here is something I feel like you can empathize with. We just moved into a new house that has 90% hardwood floors. We have refinished before, so we knew to get it done before we moved in even though that meant an additional three weeks in a tiny dark apartment with three kids and a dog. So they got it done just barely the day before our belongings were delivered from storage but it’s a TERRIBLE job. Like so bad there is no choice but to have it done again. They rushed the last step so the top coat bubbled everywhere. So now we have the pleasure of moving back out in January (because I refuse to deal with it during the holidays) and go through the whole process again. While I am very clear that this is a first world problem of the highest order, I am also feeling really rather sorry for myself.

    Kudos on the housecleaning! I predict it will be life-changing in the nicest way for you.

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  5. Runa

    I too sold a house in a residential/commercial zone and listed it only after we had moved out, which strikes me as oddly similar to your situation. Since I think real estate matters are HYPER local, I will also share that our house was an old (c. 1932) 4-bedroom Colonial in a large town/small city in southern New England.

    Anyway, in case you are collecting stories of similar parameters, here’s how we did it: a) we invested the BARE MINIMUM in fixing things up — i.e., fixed some minor plastering, repainted, addressed some plumbing issues that we knew would come up in inspection — but did NOT do floors or bathroom tiling or anything like that b) priced with the goal of selling as quickly as possible (i.e., not to maximize profit) and c) explicitly left ourselves open to both residential and commercial buyers.

    Our best offers, in terms of price, definitely came from commercial offers. But they came with contingencies around town zoning approvals, which would have taken months to go through. Our residential offers were considerably lower — i.e., by 10-20% of the list price — and in some cases also came with contingencies.

    We sold at a time when the local market was quite soft, so it took a while to sell. But the happy ending is that we DID sell, and in a very peaceful non-dramatic closing! And I know that you will too!

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  6. Gigi

    Our last few moves have involved house cleaners…it is SUCH a relief to not have to go back to clean the house you’ve moved out of. I am, ever so slowly, convincing my husband that we need a housekeeper for the “bigger” jobs (i.e., the jobs I am SO over) every month.

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  7. Suzanne

    In my experience the housecleaner guilt/expense stuff NEVER goes away but is DEEPLY mitigated by the EFFORTLESS CLEAN. And also! Housecleaners will ORGANIZE!!!!!! We now have a newly organized craft closet and linen closet and shoe closet and I feel drunk with the possibilities for Organized Spaced that *I* do not have to organize! And your plan for using the time for forced socializing is excellent.

    Reply
  8. KateB

    Something I have been thinking about with frequency while i drive around my cute town is your house. I wonder exactly what type of old house it is. What are your thoughts of finding a couple of pictures of houses that are quite similar to your new one but not your exact house? I think your other readers may be interested too. Thank you for your consideration.

    And, cleaning people are wonderful and make the love so much easier.

    Reply
    1. Swistle Post author

      That is such a good idea. In the meantime I will say that it is a 200-year-old colonial with an attached barn. The kitchen/bathrooms/electricity/roof have been updated, but leaving the general Old House flavor of the rest of the house untouched. It is a Weird Old House: there are bedrooms you can only get to by going through other bedrooms; there are two trapdoors leading to dirt/pipes (good for hiding bodies if necessary); there are a lot of low ceilings we didn’t notice until we brought our 6’4″ child in there; there are tons of weird little built-in storage areas; there are bricked-in fireplaces; the attic is full of charred beams from a chimney fire in the mid 1800s; there is The Old Kitchen (now a laundry room) from before they put in the modern kitchen; there is a weird cement-floor-with-drain room of uncertain use; there are meat hooks in the workshop; there are two staircases, one main and one “secret” (not really secret, but out of the way); there is a sideways door that can be lowered to cover/lock the secret staircase; it is easy to get lost and/or forget what floor you are on.

      Reply
  9. Jessemy

    I’m excited to see what you think regularly scheduled cleaners. I also get weird about personal space, but I’ve overcome my discomfort because coming home to a clean house feels amazing. Yay!

    Reply

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